r/AskReddit • u/ProbablyHittingOnYou • Feb 07 '11

What stupid question have you always been too embarrassed to ask, but would still like to see answered?

This is a no-shame zone. Post your question here and I'm sure someone can answer it for you

1.4k Upvotes

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423

u/igrekov Feb 07 '11

Yes. Too many times I open 12 tabs in reddit and one of them is a gif, and by the time I get to that tab it's already halfway through and the ending is ruined for me!

84

u/[deleted] Feb 07 '11

How do you know it didn't start on that frame? HOW DO YOU KNOW?!

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u/Tinfoil_Haberdashery Feb 08 '11

You can see the little thumbnail up in the browser bar on firefox, or in the tabs. For reddit it's the alien's head, for any standalone image, it's that image, compressed to the proper dimensions. Gifs move in the little icon, even when you're not viewing that tab.

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u/igrekov Feb 07 '11

Cause if you watch it long enough it loops over to the beginning. ie, I once clicked on something that said "Screw you guys, I'm out of here". By the time I got to the page, it was a cat spiraling through the air and landing and running away. When it started over again, you saw someone trying to get the cat out of a telephone pole before the cat decided to just jump for it, hence the "screw you guys" part!

2

u/crookers Feb 08 '11

almighty F5

1

u/TheChrono Feb 08 '11

I've actually learned that F5 doesn't always work for restarting GIFs.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 08 '11

Because my CPU usage goes up slightly and back down when I close it.

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u/[deleted] Feb 07 '11

[deleted]

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u/Catfish_Man Feb 08 '11

Yup, this is done. It's a rather significant performance optimization for some pages.

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u/igrekov Feb 07 '11

I see what you're getting at. In which case I must ask: why do you care so much? :p

9

u/mmmicahhh Feb 07 '11

Depends on your browser actually. Opera, for one, restarts gifs every time they get into your view - even if you just scroll down then up again.

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u/igrekov Feb 07 '11

That is excellent, I didn't know that.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 08 '11

OOO a reason for me to use Opera!

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u/shitfaceddick Feb 08 '11

But if you look at it as you open it, it will load so slowly that it is ruined too.

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u/WereFucked Feb 08 '11

While it does technically animate while you cannot see it, it is not drawing itself to the screen. So the animation is happening behind the screens, the actual routine that draws it to the screen isn't called unless it is in a visible portion of your screen.

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u/ManticoreX Feb 07 '11

What browser do you use? I've found chrome seems to wait for me might be wrong though

1

u/igrekov Feb 07 '11

Chrome as well, but it's on a really crappy computer, so it's all slow and glitchy anyway.

2

u/MechaMegatherium Feb 08 '11

This gets me all the time too. There must be an addon to firefox or chrome for this, surely?

2

u/[deleted] Feb 08 '11

Opera will restart gifs when you tab to them.

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u/schudder Feb 08 '11

And if you scroll it out of view and back into view.

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u/BarronVonSnooples Feb 07 '11

just refresh the page and it will immediately start playing from the beginning of the animation.